History Of Methodist Reform, Volume I - Media Sabda Org

newspaper, unless it be the fact that it contains, as published, the expurgated paragraph, anent the
ritual, etc., which Coke and Asbury, for politic reasons, thought best not to give to the Christmas
Conference. And it adds to the muddle and puzzle of this whole business that O'Kelly, who was a
member of the '54 Conference, says of this Circular Letter: "Wesley sent printed circular letters to
the preachers in America,'' and then immediately gives it in its unexpurgated condition. See his
"Apology," p. 5. And as Jesse Lee did not write his "History" until some ten years after, and must
have been acquainted with O'Kelly's "Apology,'' it is inexplicable that when he cites the Circular
Letter he gives it in its expurgated form, unless he simply preferred to follow the official minute
form of it from 1785 to 1795, when Asbury directed Dickins to republish these minutes in book
form. And it confirms McCaine's allegation that, as it came to the Christmas Conference it was
expurgated, unless some one can show from the manuscript or printed minutes of 1755 in the
original form that they contain the Letter unexpurgated.
4 The early Discipline also made provision for such a distinction. See "Discipline of 1790," sixth
edition, in my possession, under Section VIII., on Class-Meetings, p. 13, speaking of those who
willfully neglect these meetings: "If they do not amend, let the Elder exclude them in the society;
allowing that they are laid aside for a breach of our rules of discipline, and not for immoral conduct."
5 Henry Boehm was present and waited upon Lee during his illness and death, and gives a full
account of it in his "Reminiscences," pp. 461, 462. While in Annapolis, Lee knocked off a little skin
from his leg. It began to inflame at the campmeeting, and the fever set in. He grew worse till
mortification took place, and death ensued in three weeks. At Lee's request, Boehm closed his eyes
when dead, laid him out, and saw him buried in the family ground of Father Henry Downs; wrote
to Lee's friends in Virginia, and to Bishop McKendree. A few days after the burial, in Boehm's
absence, some brethren from Baltimore disinterred the remains and removed them to Mt. Olivet, as
mentioned in the text.
6 Tigert's "History," pp. 206, 207.
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